Let The Racing Begin

This past weekend my wife and daughter competed in events and had great results. Sean Stevens, an athlete I coach, competed in his first race of the season and performed fabulously.



Dana traveled to Galveston, TX to compete in the Lonestar Half Ironman, as prep for Ironman Brazil. She had a great race, placing 2nd overall and went 4:57. She felt the swim course was long, which was an advantage for her since she is such a good swimmer. I had an opportunity to look at her power file and she maintained a steady heart rate and wattage. Her intensity factor was an even 82% of her Functional Threshold for the entire ride. She ended up negative splitting the second loop of the bike course. Her run was just 4 minutes slower than her personal record for the distance in a stand alone half marathon, meaning that she executed this race flawlessly. Her comment after the race was “I don’t even feel like I did anything”. She is scary fit now! Here’s a photo of my trophy wife with her really cool trophy. It is a Texas star carved from Austin Stone. It weighs about 5 lbs.


Paige, one of my twin daughters, the swimmer, accompanied Dana to Galveston for the race. She ran in a 1K kid’s race and was 3rd overall. She has some talent for distance, and I’m sure there will be some triathlons in her future.


Payton competed in the Oklahoma State Gymnastic Championships. I was on hand to cheer her on. Oklahoma has a lot of great gymnasts and coaches and it is really competitive here. The meet was held in Oklahoma City at the Dynamo facility. This is where Olympic great Shannon Miller trained. Payton ended up finishing 10th in the floor and the on the beam, and 11th in the overall for level 7. I was so proud of her. I can see her progress with each meet I attend.

Sean Stevens traveled to Oceanside, California for Ironman 70.3. Sean reported before the race that he “felt good but different“. He’s had a good solid month of training behind him. This event was a “C” level race for him, but I added a bit more rest just so it would be a better experience. Sean ended up going 4:53 and finished 22nd in the competitive 30-34 age group. He has done this race before, but never has broken 5 hours. Saturday he bested his personal record by 15 minutes or so. His 1:34 half marathon was his personal best for the distance outright. Awesome!

2008 is off to a great start!